Crocheting for Newtown, CT

This is a purely informational post and a quick round-up of three opportunities I have seen on ways to donate your crochet talents to help the community of Newtown, CT.

- Amigurumi  -

The Happily Hooked on Crochet Club is collecting cuddle-sized amigurumi animals/monsters for the students and family members (including siblings) of Newtown, CT.

• Animals must be 6-12"
• Made from acrylic yarn (avoid the color red)
• Use well-fastened safety eyes or sewn on eyes.  Absolutely no beads for safety reasons.
• DEADLINE: Valentine's Day 2013

More information available here.

- Beanies for Brave Students -

1/9/2013 UPDATE: More than 600 beanies have arrived! No more beanies are needed at this time. If you have made some, go ahead and send them. Just don't start making any new hats. Follow Snappy Tots on Facebook if you would like to donate $15.00 to cover shipping through Adopt-a-box.

Heidi from Snappy-Tots has an incredible program called Beanies for Bravery. The hats are usually sent overseas to our troops along with personal notes. But, the students, teachers and family of Sandy Hook are a deserving group of people and the crochet community agrees they are brave people.

• Only plain beanies accepted. No mohawks, flowers, poms or earflaps. 
• Stripes are acceptable. 
• Must be green and white only (See Yarn Suggestions at end of post for school colors)
• DEADLINE: January 31st

All of the guidelines regarding these beanies is for fairness to the children. We don't want Sally to be jealous of Beth's hat with pretty flowers. Or, Jim jealous of Bob's mohawk. Plain and simple stripes will avoid unnecessary tension.

If you stumbled on this post and you do not crochet, you can still help by adopting the shipping for a box of beanies ($15.00).

More information available here.

- Squares for Memory Blankets -

This is being hosted in the Facebook Group:  Memory Blankets for CT Families

• 6" x 6" squares
• Green and White only
• Acrylic Yarn preferred

If this is something you are interested in contributing to, please join the Facebook group. They obviously need people to crochet squares, but they also need volunteers to assemble the collected squares into memory blankets.

- Yarn Suggestions -

Following is a list of Acrylic yarns and the color that most represents the school's shade of Green. These yarns are commercially available throughout the US.

Self-Striping Yarn:

Red Heart Team Spirit: Green/White

Solid Greens:

Red Heart With Love: Clover

Vanna's Choice: Kelly Green

I Love This Yarn: Jelly Bean

Red Heart Super Save: Paddy Green

Loops & Threads Impeccable: Deep Forest